Director, Data Science - SEM

Key Skills

A/B Testing, Java Programming, Leadership, MS Dynamics, Python Programming, SQL

Job Description

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Director, Data Science - SEM

If you are seeking a collaborative, rewarding and dynamic learning environment where a sense of humor is essential, you will love Expedia’s Search Engine Marketing (SEM) team! SEM is a multifaceted business, and we aim to apply it to be the most trusted and creative online travel agent in the world. To get there, we need outstandingly passionate, and driven people such to transform our team!

Ever wondered what it would feel like to challenge yourself in new areas of Growth Marketing? We need a dynamic, organized self-starter to drive SEM Bidding Sciences within our Growth Marketing Organization (GMO) located in Seattle, WA. We operate one of the largest marketing portfolios not only within Expedia but also in the world of travel marketing. We want you to bring greater operational focus and innovative execution to beat our financial commitments to the Operating Plan whilst using data sciences to improve our execution. You will work across the organization to enable new customer growth, improve our ROAS and push the thinking on capital allocation across SEM.

Interested in an inherently cross-functional role that gives you tremendous organizational exposure with senior leaders within the company? You will partner with Product, Software Engineering, Marketing Business and Strategy teams and share results in many executive forums. You will help facilitate cross-team and cross-channel partnerships on shared platforms. To demonstrate high Return on Ad Spend, you will provide in person updates to senior executives on channel performance and provide mentorship on future growth. You will coach and mentor your team of Marketing Data Scientists who are responsible for building algorithms, completing bidding objectives, diagnosing, and structuring growth from algorithms, crafting business strategy, calling tests and enabling cross org initiatives. Your efforts will guide the SEM to improve company revenue, reduce cost, increase customer engagement, and enhance the value of the Expedia Group!

What you’ll do:

• You will be responsible for completing bidding objectives for multiple lines of business within SEM and develop the vision for opportunity discovery and sharing ideas across different business verticals to improve demand generation for Expedia Group
• You will maintain a high attention to detail, with the ability to balance multiple, contending priorities simultaneously in a very high pressure, highly visible environment
• We expect you to develop a strategy, execution plan, and evolve our data sciences application to solve programmatically at scale with strive to build best in class
• You will actively identify and resolve issues that may impair a team's ability to meet strategic, financial, and technical goals
• We need you to hire and retain dedicated Data Scientists and Machine Learning engineers. Empower your team to achieve the organization’s vision
• You get to draw on analytical and quantitative skills, using hard data, apply data science techniques as needed to extract insights to see beyond the numbers and identify patterns to diagnose cause
• Become the subject matter authority on Google, Bing, and other search engine bidding methods and how to best extract value from the auctions using all levers possible
• Champion the diagnostics for decisions made by algorithms and determine Est metric to share and present to leadership on current business trajectory

Who you are:

• Excellent critical thinking and strong operating skills including proficiency in Agile methodology
• Bachelor’s in Economics, Mathematics, Statistics or Computer Science or related field; or equivalent related professional experience 
• A product approach to evolve and build our ecosystem to be best in travel industry
• Significant and tried industry experience in running business or technology teams, preferably in critical areas of e-commerce
• Experience building, diagnosing, and improving data models used for testing strategies and operational execution
• Travel or hospitality proven experience, highly valued
• Shown ability to understand and discuss technical concepts, address trade-offs, and evaluate opportunistic new insights with internal and external partners
• Strong written and verbal skills along with cross-functional program management.
• Shown ability to lead in a matrix environment
• Strong interpersonal and talent leadership skills, including identifying and developing high-energy talent – in the field of data sciences is highly valued
• 5 years of operating experience in an Agile environment with strong analytical and debugging skills
• 10 years of work experience in a technical marketing role
• Strong background in setup and measurement of A|B and Multi-Variant tests on an e-commerce platform backed by strong statistical application